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Central Desert
. The yellow area to the east, which connects to it, is the Rainshadow Desert.]] The Central Desert is a vast desert in the centre of the supercontinent Pangaea II in 200 million AD. Although it takes up almost all of the continent, it does not extent to any of the coasts, and fuses into the Rainshadow Desert towards the Pangaea II coastal mountain range in the far east of the continent. Combined, the two deserts cover 19,800,000 square miles. Geography The Central Desert was formed by the combination of several other deserts, which ran into one another when the continents fused to form Pangaea II. This also created chains of jagged mountain peaks and small plateaus in the interior of the continent, and the Central Desert is "''a wilderness of drifting sand seas, sun-cracked stones and shattered gravel". Rock formations formed by weathering and erosion also seem to be somewhat common. Beneath the sand of the Central Desert is an extended system of underground reservoirs formed out of limestone caves and water-filled fissures, which stretch out for thousands of kilometres. These limestone deposits are the remains of reefs and muds from the Shallow Sea which once covered the region: as the continents collided to form Pangaea II, the land rose up, displacing the sea and compressing the mud reefs into solid stone. The shelly debris of vanished marine life below the mud was easily eroded and dissolved by acids in the groundwater, creating small holes in the rock, which eventually grew into large caves. These caves were filled with water by constant rainstorms which drenched the seaward mountain slopes and soaked into the strata, eventually seeping into the porous limestone in the centre of the continent. The water from these reservoirs seeps up to the surface, creating small lakes, pools, and oases which provide the only water on the desert's surface. Since they're supplied by the underground reservoirs, these pools never evaporate despite the heat. Climate Unbearably dry and with temperatures ranging from freezing to boiling, the Central Desert boasts one of Pangaea II's most inhospitable environments. In the centre of the continent, far from the Global Ocean, there are no clouds in the sky, and some remote regions of the desert have not seen rain for hundreds of years. In the summer, the sun sears the bare rocks and sand so much that temperatures can reach 50°C in the daytime. However, after nightfall the heat is radiated to the sky, and temperatures may dive to -30°C: in the winter, parts of the northern interior of the Central Desert are colder than any other part of the Earth's surface has ever been. Temperatures in the underground caverns, completely blocked off from the sun, are significantly cooler. Life Plant and animal life is sparse in the Central Desert on account of its extreme climatic conditions. The only flora which seems to grow there are long, dry grasses of the type found in Human era savannahs, but even these are fairly rare. , including the gloomworm (''left) and the slickribbon (right).]] The only animals which spend a significant amount of time on the surface of the desert are garden worms, semiaquatic polychaetes which have formed a symbiotic relationship with green algae, which gives them nutrition. However, for the algae to photosynthesize, garden worms have to spend time basking in the sun. The algae which grows in the garden worm's tendrils is some of the only vegetation availible for other desert animals. Most animal life in the Central Desert lives in the cavernous underground reservoirs deep below the sand, where life derives energy from chemicals in the water instead of sunlight. This is where the garden worms originate, and the caverns are home to other species of polychaete worm, including small bacteria-eating gloomworms and large predatory slickribbons, the apex predators of the caverns. The most succesful animals of the Central Desert are the terabytes, a species of city-building termite which are divided into several distinct castes, only one of which, the transporter, is capable of independent locomotion. The terabytes survive in their towers on the desert surface by harvesting algae from garden worms, which is grown in "greenhouses" and hydrated by water carrier terabytes, which are carried down specially-constructed tunnels to suck up water from the underground reservoirs. Gallery FIW 1x10 Desert plateau.png FIW_1x10_Terabyte_towers_in_tall_grass.png FIW 1x10 Central Desert oasis.png FIW_1x10_Rocky_ground.png FIW 1x10 Central Desert terabyte mounds.png Behind the scenes In "The Endless Desert," the Central Desert was filmed at Wickwar Quarry in Gloucestershire, and in the New Mexican desert. The reservoirs below the desert were filmed at Wookey Hole Caves in Somerset. Both the New Mexican Desert and Wookey Hole Caves were also used as filming locations in "Cold Kansas Desert". List of appearances Which is your favourite organism of the ? Terabyte Garden worm Gloomworm Slickribbon *''The Future Is Wild'' **1x01. Welcome to the Future **1x10. The Endless Desert **''The Future Is Wild'' (US) *''The Future is Wild: A Natural History of the Future'' *''The Future Is Wild'' (fulldome show) *''The Future Is Wild'' animated series **1x09. The Future Is Underground **1x13. Night Crawlers **1x19. Swimming With Slickribbons **1x21. He Might Be Giant *''The Future Is Wild: The Living Book'' Notes *In "The Endless Desert," the map of Pangaea II depicts the Rainshadow Desert's border with the Central Desert as having a number of significantly large lakes, comparable to the Great Lakes of Africa or North America. These lakes are not mentioned in either the documentary or The Future Is Wild: A Natural History of the Future: indeed, according to the documentary, the only water on the surface of the Central Desert is found in "small oases". *In both the Animal Planet version of The Future Is Wild and the ''The Future Is Wild'' fulldome show, no distinction is made between the Central Desert and the Rainshadow Desert. The official introductory video for 200 million AD also includes an unused shot of rainshadow plants in what appears to be the Central Desert. **The fulldome show also incorrectly places the silver spider in the Central Desert, depicting it as living in terabyte towers. In other languages References Navigation Category:Ecoregions Category:Ecoregions of 200 million AD Category:Ecoregions of Pangaea II Category:200 million AD